_Dear Father_:
The seventy-five dollars a week that you promised me in yours of the
11th inst., are already mine, for there isn't any Helen Heath now. There
_is_ a Mrs. Pierrepont Graham, whose first name is Helen, and I guess
you'll find her pretty nearly the same young woman who took you into
camp so neatly on the voyage to New York. She reached Chicago five days
ago, and her glowing reports about your subjugation, backed up by your
promise to raise me to seventy-five on the day I married Helen Heath,
decided us to plunge into the sea of matrimony before we stopped to find
whether the water was cold or not. It wasn't, as it happened; but that's
another affair.
Our wedding was a quiet affair, and would have pleased you by its utter
lack of ostentation. We took a carriage at Helen's house and drove to
the home of old Dr. Ramage, the superannuated Methodist parson, who is
glad to eke out his stipend by marrying and no questions asked. Somehow
General Heath got wind of what was going forward, and he sent out a line
of scouts to reconnoitre our movements. One of his men intersected our
line at Clark street, and an orderly was immediately despatched on a
street-car to the general with the news in cipher. The gallant old
commander mounted a hansom and proceeded on the double-quick to our
temporary camp--otherwise the parlor of Dr. Ramage. He moved on us in
good order, and charged our intrenchments just as the doctor was asking
Helen if she would love, cherish and obey. He was in high good
spirits--in fact, I should say that good spirits were high in him by the
change in the atmosphere after he arrived--and he insisted that the
ceremony be begun all over again, so that he shouldn't lose a single
syllable. I am glad to find that the old boy is highly pleased by my
alliance with his noble family. He cracked a joke to the effect that his
side of the house had the blood and ours the pork, and that the
combination would be irresistible; but I was too much absorbed in my own
happiness just then to feel hurt. He wanted to know when you were coming
home, as he had a very important business scheme to propose to you. If I
were you I'd let him have ten or fifteen thousand for the sake of Helen,
who is a dear girl, and takes after her mother.
The going home to Ma was something of a trial, and if Helen hadn't been
a mighty sensible girl, she'd have declined to stay in the house a
single night. Ma cut up badly because there had been no bridesmaids nor
wedding-cake, and when I quoted your endorsement of a speedy marriage,
she said you were an old fool, who, if you had stopped to think, would
probably never have got married yourself. I couldn't just see where she
complimented herself very much by that, but I didn't try to show her the
errors of her logic just then. I just bucked up and gave her a
tremendous steer about the romance that must be in her nature, although
perhaps long dormant from the force of circumstances. This veiled
allusion to you mollified Ma a good deal, and pretty soon she calmed
down completely and asked us to come in and stay as long as we liked.
We made a very merry little party after all. Ma sent out to a caterer's
for a good spread and produced some champagne in some mysterious
manner--I'd no idea there was any in the house. Pretty soon the General
turned up and Ma was wonderfully cordial. She even brought him a bottle
of your 1830 Private Stock, and the way stock went down would have
tickled the bears on 'Change half to death. The General was good enough
to say, before we escorted him to his chamber, that your taste in such
things was impeccable--that was his very word, "impeccable, sir." I
can't refrain from telling you that he made a deep impression on Ma, and
I think if I were you I wouldn't linger in Boston too long.
Do you know that your last letter, so full of philosophy as applied to
matrimony, has set me to wondering what has made you such an expert on
wives. You talk of nagging women, and sulky women, and violent women,
quite as if by the book. Where your vast experience in such matters has
come from I can't quite make out. At any rate I want it distinctly
understood that it mustn't be taken as reflecting on Ma. Ma is now ace
high with Mr. and Mrs. Pierrepont Graham, having proven herself a true
thoroughbred. She has cleaned the house entirely of Graham food
products, sending them all to the Home for Half Orphans, has hired a
decent cook in place of your Scandinavian horror, and allows that she
likes the smell of cigars in the drawing-room. From this on, my vote is
for Ma, no matter what office she may run for.
I may mention in passing that Ma said a rather curious thing the other
day, which you may be able to explain. I had made some foolish remark
about getting a divorce because of something Helen had said, and Ma
reproved me for it. I laughed and said to Helen, "Mother never could
take a joke."
This evidently displeased Ma, for she replied, "You seem to have
forgotten, Pierrepont, that I married your father."
Women are queer creatures, anyhow. You are everlastingly right, father,
in what you say about the undesirability of having them in places of
business. I took Helen to the packing house to-day, intending to show
her through the establishment. But one glance at the luckless hogs
"travelling into dry salt at the rate of one a minute," as you once so
poetically expressed it, drove all idea of further investigation out of
her pretty head. She said she'd take for granted all the wonderful facts
of sausage and lard, and proposed lunch at the Palmer House instead. So
you see, my little experiment took some valuable time out of the house.
Helen goes further than either of us in this distaste for women in
business and says she doesn't think we ought to have girl typewriters.
That was after she caught sight of mine, who isn't the worst ever, as
you know.
But, so far, I am pleased to state, the honeymoon has not waned an atom.
We are keeping pretty close to the house, for what a shock it would be
to society if they knew we had been married without hustling off on a
wedding tour. The bridal trip business has always struck me as
nonsensical. The way people act after the minister gives the word, you
would think that they hated the place where they determined upon the
irrevocable step. After you get home and certain matters are adjusted, I
think I would like to go to Europe. You see, Helen has been there and no
man likes to be at a disadvantage with his wife.
You may feel more friendly towards this foreign tour when I tell you
that since Helen forsook her native Heath she has become very
confidential with me and has told me some of the particulars of her
first meeting with you. I just naturally am pleased with the details,
for it is extremely gratifying to a man to feel that his father
corroborates his good taste in the selection of the girl of his choice.
It is certainly most creditable to the largeness of your paternal heart
that you should have paid her so much attention in the first few days
out of Liverpool. It was a great courtesy for you to arrange her tray
for her on deck and to relieve her of the necessity of feeing the
stewards.
Equally kind was your aid in adjusting her wrap on the windy afternoon
that you sat alone with her in the lee of the smokestack. But it was
unfortunate, was it not, that your forgetfulness in not withdrawing
your arm from the back of her steamer chair was called to your attention
by Helen's chance remark that she was acquainted with me? Mother has
never been abroad, so I have not told her of your gallantry to your
fellow-passenger. She might not understand steamer conventions. Helen,
perhaps, might mention the matter to her casually. If we go abroad, as I
suggest to you, I will take special pains to destroy her entire
recollection of the trip with you.
Oh, by the way, it occurs to me to tell you that Cy Willoughby--the
widower, not his brother Seth--has disinherited his son Arthur, because
he married a typewriter. It was not because of the _mésalliance_, but it
was because it was the _father's_ typewriter that Arthur married.
Possibly, when I think of Helen, I should have more than the dictates of
filial affection as a reason for gratitude that Ma did not succumb a
year ago last winter to pneumonia and the six doctors you insisted on
having. As you so succinctly express it, Helen is not getting any the
best of it in marrying me. Her pater may not be very much of a
financial proposition, and more of a bottle than a battle-scarred
warrior, but he can talk about his great-grandfather, and that's more
than you care to do, I fancy. Blood may not amount to much, except in
racehorses, but when you balance things up, by and large, neither of the
two families need to take off their hats to the other. I'm glad Helen
has a family whose pictures she's not afraid to show, for it sort of
evens things up for our money. (I note that I have omitted the "y"
before "our," but you will understand that it belongs there.)
I gather from your last letter that your curiosity is aroused as to how
I proposed. I did it in person. It happened at a dance. I told Helen the
other day that she really paved the way for my proposal, but I saw by
the look on her face that it would not be safe to pursue the subject, so
I turned it off with a jest. You will judge. When it came time to dance
the cotillion she said she was tired, and that, anyway, she knew a
better step than any that would be danced. So we went out into the
hallway and she showed me the step, which was on the stairs, and we sat
there till the cotillion was over. When we returned to the ballroom she
had me guessing as to where I would get the engagement ring, for though
love is blind, it's not stone-blind--not if the stone is a diamond.
As for what I said, well, I wouldn't repeat it, even if I remembered it.
I guess I must have talked a lot of rot. I referred to it once in a
casual way and Helen burst out laughing. I recall that she didn't laugh
at the time. She probably realized that laughter is apt to scare away
fish.
I am very happy, for I have discovered that your daughter-in-law is not
perfect, and that makes the inequality between us seem a trifle less.
She cried yesterday, and said I was unkind, and all because when we were
planning the house that I have decided you shall build for us, I
suggested that she lay out the clothes-closets and have the architect
draw his plans around them. It is evident that repartee is not always
appreciated in the family circle.
I was interrupted yesterday by a call to settle a dispute between Helen
and Ma, as to whether it is good form for a young married woman to
invite lady friends who are strangers to her husband to call informally
before they have been introduced to him. What could I do? I looked wise
and said it was a grave point. I said I would consult the society editor
of the _Ladies' Home Journal_ and went out, ostensibly to send a wire to
Bok.
When I returned I found my wife in tears--second crop. She had read the
concluding pages of this letter--justified her conduct by the
observation that there should be no secrets between husband and wife.
She takes exceptions to what I have written you about my proposal. I am
finishing this letter down town. I am now going to 'phone Helen to see
if I can come home to dinner.
Your Benedict son,
Pierrepont.
P.S. You need not consider it necessary to continue your advisory
letters to me. I can see that I will receive all the advice I need from
Mrs. Pierrepont.